The Second Sown the Wind, the First Will Reap the Whirlwind
by bunghoney
Summary: Due to heavy timey-wimey, Ten, Eleven, River, Captain Jack and some other old friends gather at New Earth. Contains Ten angst, Eleven re-inacting Gulliver's travels, Rory messing up, cats in a city guerilla, River and Jack's first meeting, a ballet dancer with a with a soft spot for cod, Ten showing off for River and Eleven & River celebrating Eleven's birthday in a... special way.
1. The Overlooked Millennium

Ok, hi!

This is quite a complicated story to sum up, since everything I give away will pretty much be a spoiler... But let's put it like this:

**Summary:** While Eleven is sulking over people forgetting his birthday, his thousand turns out to be a real thrill. Due to heavy timey-wimey, Ten, Eleven, River, Captain Jack and some other old friends eventually converge at New Earth.

Contains Ten angst, River and Jack's first meeting, Rory messing up, River being clever, Eleven re-inacting Gulliver's travels, Ten being humiliated by something not alive, a notorious merchant getting more than one headache, cats participating in a city guerilla, Ten showing off for River, a ballet dancer with a soft spot for cod and Eleven & River celebrating Eleven's birthday in a... special way.

**Time/space:** In this story the "now" is primarily Elevens pov and set roughly somewhere between A Good Man Goes to War and The Wedding of River Song. In Ten's timeline, it's very specific: he's right before The Waters of Mars. River.. well, nobody ever really knows here River is, do we? But she's definitely an older version. I also guarantee wibbly-wobbly – lots and lots of messy time travel in here!

**AU or not: **Well, I don't consider this to be an AU-story, no, I think it all fits into canon. I do know there might be a slight glitch in the whole "Ten did meet River again before he regenerated"-scenario though, but it's not really impossible so, well, I just went with it because I really can't stand the thought of them having met only that time in The Library. And old Moffat isn't exactly that precise with his storylines either, so what the hell. :)

**Spoilers: **Hints at pretty much the whole reboot, seasons 3, 4, and 6 in particular. Heavy on Gridlock, The End of Time, The Silence in the Library two-parter and The Wedding of River Song.

**Rating: I**t's K+ now but will eventually be M because of that birthday celebration of River & Eleven to come.

**Disclaimer: **Don't own any of the famous characters in this story. Unfortunately.

I've plotted out the entire story already - I find it very hard to manage haphazard timey-wimey - (oh, isn't that an oxymoron...), but haven't written it down in dialogue and all. Chapters will be posted as soon as they're ready. And oh, since English isn't my native language I might have made a few spelling or grammatical mistakes, I'd like to apologize in advance for that.

Okay then, off we go!

* * *

******Space:** Inside the travelling TARDIS**  
********Time: **As present as time can be

It was midnight. The TARDIS laid all in silence, except for the low humming sound she always made when travelling through the vortex. The golden lights were dimly lit, wrapping the room in a warm, soft blanket of light. No rustling, no flickering, no alarms going off. The atmosphere was, for once, quite peaceful.

The Eleventh Doctor stood by the console, pawing a few buttons and levers, checking a screen, straightening his bow-tie. His hand lingered on a big blue round button, his fingers thrumming a little rhythm there.

"Boringers, blue boringers," he muttered, looking slightly annoyed.

He started pacing around the console. After having counted about twenty laps, he tried skipping a little. Then, he turned around to walk backwards. He tiptoed. He did frog jumps. He moved his body sideways, and backwards, and sideways again. He even travelled a small distance on his hands.

When he had tried out all of John Cleese's silly walks, he finally came to a halt. The Doctor didn't like to admit it, but he was actually quite... bored. He found the sheer fact that his body was able to be in this state very annoying. How could that be? He, who could easily travel anywhere and anywhen he wanted, he who could enjoy pretty much what came to his mind. He, who could conquer a country, ride a bob sleigh, fly any spaceship or try out liquorice/tuna ice cream. Bored! Huh. He didn't find boredom very dignifying for a Time Lord.

But the truth was - he was. Amy and Rory were fast asleep, and the TARDIS was travelling a pretty long way this time and he had promised them no pit stops since Amy had really wanted to have breakfast at Hyperion, they had a particularly good water melon smoothie over there.

If he was being honest to himself, there was actually another reason for him being extra annoyed by being bored today. Even though "today" was very relative when you were the Doctor, today, or maybe the past twenty three hours, was his birthday.

And it was not just any ordinary old birthday, no, today the Doctor turned no less than a thousand year old. He couldn't really see how that wasn't a reason for all of the universes getting together, throwing him the biggest surprise party world history had ever seen. Unfortunately, the truth was the total opposite. Much to his vexation, nobody had showed any signs of remembering his great anniversary, even though he _had_ hinted at it for quite some time ("Oh, I wonder how many years I could be this day? Rory, Amy, wanna take a guess? No?") and now it was only an hour left of his birthday.

The Doctor pouted and sauntered down the stairs, over to the shelf where he kept all of his movies. He ran his hand over the back of the cover of Duck Soup, but threw it away. He had watched all of his films more than three times now, he had even started re-watching the ones that his tenth self had liked, like the French New Wave stuff - he could clearly remember really liking The Four Hundred Blows. Nowadays he fell asleep just by watching the cover.

Maybe he could do that, actually, watch some old Godard movie that would soon lull him to sleep just to put an end to the boring disappointment this day had turned out to be. He yanked the dvd out of the shelf and was just about to head for his bedroom when all of a sudden-

CRASH!

The loud bang made the Doctor jump, and half a millisecond later he was hit by something heavy and soft and oddly enough pretty good-smelling, he noticed, as he found himself trapped between the floor and this something. After he had gotten over the initial chock of being knocked out of balance, he started to struggle to free himself, but his upper body was entangled in some sort of fabric and he slightly panicked before he managed to uncover his head. It didn't really help, though, since he had fallen onto his stomach and would have to crane his neck in a kind of impossible angle to have a look at what was pinning him to the floor. He twisted and struggled, trying to free himself, but the something had gotten hold of his wrists, holding them tight, effectively preventing him from moving. It seemed like he was stuck, face flat to the floor.

"Well, I suppose that getting the 'surprise' out of a 'surprise party' is at least half a birthday celebration," he muttered.

At the sound of this, the something moved. It crept up his body, sort of leaned in over him, and then said in his ear:

"I don't believe you! You can not be serious, no, you just can't. Doctor, is today your birthday?"

"River?" the Doctor spat out from where he lay sprawled on the floor. "Yes, yes, it is, River! I'm so happy you came, even though it's very last minute, but I still appreciate it. You did read the list of preferred presents, didn't you? I do understand if you couldn't get the pink elephant, but the Sycorax motorcycle? Yes? No?"

River didn't reply, but slowly released his wrists and rose to her feet. She shook the dust out of her hair, straightened her jacket and brushed off her sleeves.

The Doctor flipped over, now lying on his back with a wide grin on his face.

"And under no circumstances do I want any strawberries on the cake, only a lot of custard."

He smiled at her. River didn't smile back. In fact, she looked mad. _Really _mad, actually, if you wanted to put it that way.

"O-kay? No cake? Nope? Are we maybe... going out then? I know this really good restaurant at the egde of one of Neptune's moons, they serve things that are exotic even to me, such as grilled intergalactic zebra and-"

River stood frozen, just staring at him.

"Um, okay, no... I have to say, it doesn't exactly look like we're going out, either. So... okay, I think this might be a good time to pose the question: where have you just been?"

The Doctors eyes widened and there was some arm-related flailing when as a response to that, River grabbed his lapels and brusquely pulled him into a sitting position.

"Oh you fool, I have been with _you_!"

"Me?"

He pointed a finger to his chest.

"Yes, you! Unless there is some other idiot swaying around the universe calling himself the Doctor!"

"As far as I know, I'm unfortunately the one and only," the Doctor muttered, not at all pleased with the tone she used. "Where, or when, have you been?"

"I've just come from another birthday of yours."

"That is reassuring to hear, that you seem to care about at least _one _of them," the Doctor snorted.

"Oh, please, Doctor, don't play that victim card - I've spent over a hundred birthdays with you. And realizing this is also a birthday, I see we have a problem here: can I see your diary?"

"No, because I gave it as a gift to a person who didn't get any for his very special birthday," the Doctor pouted.

"Oh, you self-absorbed, sulking moron! How old are you turning today? Five? Just give it to me. I need to know why you willingly risked the existence of the whole of time and space by compulsively wanting to re-live a day that to me seems to be one of the worst in the category of birthdays," River said, staring at him.

"What? Why? What?" The Doctor was getting worked up. "I haven't been going on some splendid 're-living a nice day'-trip today, the only thing I've done for twenty four hours is stand here, all alone, in this... stupid, boring, just travelling vehicle, nobody hasn't even wished me a happy birthday and now you're picking on me for something I haven't done yet? That's like... scolding at a twenty year old Margaret Thatcher! By that age, all she had done was inventing the soft serve, which is a ___good _thing! I might not have come up with a fabulous dessert, but I did do a few other fantastic things, like for instance saving countless spaceships and planets and entire species and galaxies and universes ten times or more so I'd like to have the right to not being scoffed at, and especially not by you, at my birthday."

"Is there any possibility that you would consider keeping the volume of this little marital - or, well, pre, post, marital, whatever - barney down?"

Rory appeared in the door frame, heavy-lidded and bedheaded, apparently having been woken up by their argument.

"I'm very sorry for belonging to a species that demands it, but your human pets are trying to get some sleep."

His eyes flickered between the Doctor, sprawled on the floor, and River kneeling, still holding the Doctors lapels. "Um... special occasion?" Rory asked, a little unsure of what this scene actually meant.

"Yes! Yes, Rory, as a matter of fact, it is!" the Doctor muttered. He freed himself from River's grip and got up on his feet. "Today, I turn no less than a thousand years old and thank you very much for not noticing. So far, my presents have been a tell-off and, let's see... nothing! And since you don't seem to bring up the subject yourself: did you and Pond happen to bring any proper gifts for this very special day?

"Um, well, congratulations, man," Rory said clumsily. "Didn't bring presents, not this time, we didn't know... Sorry 'bout that. Really sorry."

The Doctors face fell a little.

"Not switching travelling companions every second year would probably help from people not remembering or even knowing your birthday, " Amy filled in, appearing behind Rory. "And by the way: how do _you _even know it's your birthday?" she continued in disbelief.

The Doctor snorted.

"Is that so hard to figure out? Oh, you humans with your tiny human brains. I keep a count, of course! When I first left Gallifrey, I celebrated my birthday haphazardly, just by coincidence every time I happened to arrive at a December 21st, but a couple of hundred years ago I changed it to actually go visit a December 21th every 365 days. That way even I can have a proper birthday, even though nobody seems to remember it, I do enjoy knowing that I have one. "

"Doctor, that's very lovely and all," River said, "but tell me one thing: there are so many, many years in all of the universes calendars, why did you have to visit the same December 21st twice? What's so important about that specific december day?"

"Since I have never done such a thing, I am still not the proper Doctor to be yelling at for this matter," the Doctor said, very defensive now. "Why am I to be blamed if the twelfth or thirteenth edition of me decides to go on some misbegotten expedition in spacetime? And by the way, what do you know about that being impossible? By that time, all today's laws of time might have ceased to exist and he can go cancan with any edition of himself he wants to!"

"In the future, yes, if that would have been the case," River said, "but one of the Doctors present were you. The first one was definitely silly bow-tie guy you, and the second one was skinny coat guy, in that long faux suede coat."

The Doctor looked offended.

"Fake? That coat is not fake, it happen to be a hand sewn ___genuine -_ thank you very much - suede coat, made by Janis Joplins great grandmother, Ms. Arminta Robertson, who was born in Sweden in the late 19th century and received the suede as a dowry from her soon to be husband, I think his name was Porter, Robert Porter, if I'm not mistaken, very nice man, when they moved to New England and-"

"Doctor!" River interrupted, grabbing him by the shoulders and shaking him. "Focus! For once! Listen to me! I've just watched you interfere not only with yourself, but a younger version of yourself. This is kind of bad. "

The Doctor stilled. It seemed like he had finally realized what she was trying to tell him. He blinked a couple of times, swallowed, and then fell silent.

He was brought back to reality as Rory gently knocked on his shoulder.

"What?" he said, turning around.

Rory was clumsily hiding his hand behind his back, and he looked almost shy as he addressed the Doctor.

"Okay, I-I know it's not much, but I found this and it looks like a really cool leather bracelet," he said, showing the Doctor the said leather bracelet with a flap covering the front. "It seems like it could be a suitable present for you, with this display and all, look, it has quite a few really cool functions... I think you could wear it on Sundays."

Rory removed the flap covering the display and some buttons and pushed a few of them trying to demonstrate to the Doctor what they did.

Then it all happened at once. The Doctor saw Rivers face changing its expression, her eyes widening in horror while mouthing a "No!". She plunged forward, trying to get hold of Rory, but it was too late. Before the Doctor could say "suede coats are cool," Rory had vanished from the spot.

The room fell quiet.

"Sometimes I have a really hard time believing that I actually carry those genes," River said dryly, having covered her eyes with her hand. After a little silence, she peeked through her fingers and said:

"But oh well. There it is."

"What is? The sight of a really bad gene pool?"

"No, the explanation to why you were having a double date with yourself in the year 4. 999. 999. 993"

"What?" the Doctor raised his eyebrows.

"I now realize why you had, well, have, to go interfere with yourself. You had your reasons."

"What?" the Doctor stared at her in utter disbelief.

River sighed.

"Well, that 'bracelet' Mr. Williams so very kindly was trying to give you for your birthday, that happened to be mine, and it happened to be my vortex manipulator. I usually keep it in my pocket while I travel since the strap is a little too tight and it must've fallen out when I landed. The device was set to only being able to travel between here and there, and only for two trips," River explained. "Rory has effectively sent himself to New New York, and I doubt he'll be clever enough to figure out how to get back here. You, the eleventh you, were there because you'll now have to go get him, because you are the only one that could re-calibrate the manipulator, you did it for me in the first place – you never really gave me an explanation, you just muttered something about timey-wimey – so you don't really have a choice. "

The Doctor just stared at her. He blinked. Once, twice. Then, slowly, his face cracked up.

"Did I say that a surprise couldn't be a party?" he said, the stupid grin accompanied by sparkling eyes.

He jumped to his feet and enthusiastically clapped his hands.

"Oh! So off we go! Need to get rid of you, then, Doctor Song, sorry 'bout that, but you know we can't all go! Would bring too much attention to the operation, more than one soul crossing its own timeline, and Pond, you keep your mother company, hey, hey off we go!"

He pushed River and Amy out through the door, waving them off while they were protesting loudly.

"What are you doing, you old fool? Don't you realize this is a very serious operation that would care for some planning?

"Of course I do, but since when do I plan anything? Didn't you know that the expression 'go with the flow' is actually Time Lord and was invented by, well, me, when I was accidentally rafting on the largest wave of time energy in all of history? No one on Gallifrey had ever seen such a relaxed attitude towards being totally out of control! King of out of control, they called me!"

"It's freezing out here!" River snorted. "Don't you dare be away for more than five minutes!

"Be back in a wink, River, promise you that, and Amy, I'm so sorry for this happening to Rory all over again, but I promise I'll bring him back, safe and sound, as usual!"

"You are so really not sorry," Amy said, shaking her head in disbelief. "You actually ___enjoy _this, don't you?"

As an answer to that, the Doctor just blinked at her and grinned before he slammed the door in their faces and rushed to the control panel, not being able to his enthusiasm.

"Always like a good adventure, right?" the Doctor said to himself, practically bouncing around, pushing buttons and pulling levers as if there was no tomorrow. The TARDIS took off, and he shouted "yee-haa!" like a cowboy. Skipping round the console, excited as he was, he eventually tripped over his own feet and fell onto a seat and leaned back into it, catching his breath. After all, this was going to be an exciting night.


	2. A Bad Man Comes Ashore

**A Bad Man Comes Ashore.**

**Space: **At the shore of New New York.  
**Time: **Earlier that day. (Well, from River Songs perspective, that is.)

New New York was a place that didn't seem to change that much over time. When watching the large city's skyline from the shore, there were the flying vehicles, the grey skyscrapers and the apple grass, all of it as ever present. The sky was blue, the sun was shining, you could feel a light breeze and the city itself seemed to hum a little from the sheer pleasure of existing.

Making its usual noise, the TARDIS materialized right across the old hospital. Having come to shape, it settled smoothly in the grass. Then nothing happened. For quite some time nobody jumped out, nobody shouted, nobody seemed interested in discovering this particular planet, this particular day.

Then, slowly, the door creaked open and the Tenth Doctor peeked out. His eyes were hooded, as if from a long nights sleep after long waking hours with too much to drink. His costume was wrinkled, the hair more ruffled than usual, his trainers untied and dirty. Over his left shoulder he carried his beloved suede coat, seemingly not really caring about it. He blinked a couple of times, trying to adjust to the daylight, then checking the surroundings as if he didn't really know where he was, or why.

He held on to the door frame so hard his knuckles whitened.

Slowly, he pushed the door fully ajar, and walked out, the coat trailing after him. He absentmindedly pulled his fringe, looked around, paced a little, shuffled his feet. Then, he folded his hands behind his back, spread his legs a little and stilled.

He rose his head, and his gaze wandered to the other side of the bay where he, even from this great distance, could see people moving, vehicles driving and intergalactic creatures hoovering over buildings at the shore. For quite some time he didn't move, even though his eyes kept flickering as if he was expecting something unexpected to happen.

Another fifteen minutes went by. The Doctor picked up the coat he had dropped on the ground and spread it as a blanket, then laid down on his back. The sky was really intense blue this time a year, he noticed. He watched little clouds chasing after each other, reminding him of another time at this shore, a very, very long time ago.

He closed his eyes to get rid of the sight.

Then he must have dozed off, because he soon found himself in a very rare state for a Time Lord: he was dreaming. Even though still somehow semi-conscious, he wasn't at all used to this since his brain didn't require much sleep, the evolution had almost erased the REM-sleep from the Time Lords sleeping cycle. This left them just falling right down to the deep sleep, being able to get the rest they needed from only that, and there were no dreams in that kind of state.

But some remains of the REM-phase was still there, and in the lucid dream state the Doctor found himself in a very familiar situation: he was monitoring the TARDIS, just in for landing. The vehicle was piloted by the six people she actually required, five of them recognizable as his close old friends - Rose, Martha, Jack, Donna and Luke Smith all concentrated on keeping the vessel on track. They all seemed to enjoy themselves, and so did the Doctor, bouncing around, babbling and piloting. There was a great deal of laughter when he couldn't manage to keep the cabin upright, and when they flipped upside down he simply pushed the anti-gravity button and in a second they were all floating mid-air. His co-pilots seemed to have the time of their life, riding this roller-coaster.

But all of a sudden, a blaring alarm went off and in a minute, the TARDIS started to shake uncontrollably. The Doctor found himself troubleshooting, checking every screen and pulling every lever, but nothing seemed to help. The others tried to keep the TARDIS on track, but no one of them could fully keep up with the blue boxes' many twists and turns. He feverishly tried to isolate the problem that caused the turbulence, but couldn't find anything wrong when he realized that smoke was starting to pour out of the engines. The console was turning incredible hot, almost burning, making the TARDIS impossible to keep on course. Thick, black smoke filled the console room, making it very hard to breathe. He, with his respiratory bypass system, had no trouble closing down his lungs, but his passengers didn't have that possibility. In a moment hey started to faint, little Luke at first, but soon followed by Rose and Jack. The TARDIS was tumbling upside down, impossible to steer: she was clearly falling out of the vortex.

Then, for just a second, it all went black.

When the light returned to the scene, it came back forcefully. The Doctor was standing in the middle of a raging fire, the fuel obviously being remains of the TARDIS that had crashed into something unknown. As far as he could see, there was an ocean of never ending flames.

But the vehicle wasn't all that the crash landing had torn into pieces. Around him, haphazardly scattered, laid body parts from all of his friends. Arm, legs, hands, hearts and heads surrounded him where he stood.

As if being in the eye of the storm or clad in an iron armor the Doctor stood upright in the middle of the fire. His own body didn't seem to have obtained a single scratch.

Slowly, he sank to the ground.

While he kneeled he sensed some strange kind of energy over and around him, which made him turn to the sky. Over his head hung Donnas arm, hoovering in mid-air and the hand lowered itself to stroke his cheek. And from out of nowhere, he heard her voice in his ear: "Hello sweetie."

All of a sudden, the Doctor sat up with a gasp. He took a very deep breath and stared in to the eyes of a smiling River Song, who was sitting beside him, legs folded, on his coat.

The Doctor exhaled in staccato. Clearly, his body had been preparing to fight by running in the respiratory bypass mode for a couple of minutes, and now it had a little trouble getting the air supply system back on track.

"Hell- hello," he managed to croak.

"Because..." River said, "it _is _you, right? This edition is kind of unfamiliar to me, but you do lay beside the TARDIS."

"Um, uh..." he said, trying to take a couple of calm breaths. He did manage without oxygen, but the lack of it also made his brain a little slower.

"Really? Is that a yes?" River eyed him suspiciously. "Being this quiet, I'd say it's highly unlikely that this is you. Are you the one traveling with him?"

She stood up, watched him closely and then turned around, heading for the TARDIS. "Is he okay? Is he in there?"

"No, wait, it's me, it really is. Look, Professor Song - " the Doctor took out his screwdriver and gave it a little whirr "- I'm just a little... shaken," he finished.

River turned around and by the sight of the screwdriver, she seemed finally convinced that it was actually him.

"Oh, _Professor_ Song, we are playing _that _game now, are we?" she said, winking at him. "Well, not that I'm objecting, it sounds like a perfectly suitable game for a birthday, sweetie, that's right. So if I'm the professor, who are you going to be this time? The pilot or the fire fighter? I think I prefer fire fighter, we did the pilot so many times now..."

The Doctor stared at her, thinking that he was probably still dizzy from the lack of oxygen.

"None, thank you, I don't seem to be particularly good at any of it," he muttered. "Thank you for coming, Professor, um, but it's really time for me to leave. Goodbye. I'll see you around." He quickly rose to his feet, straightened his jacket and put on his coat. Then he shoved his hands in his pockets, turned his back and headed for the TARDIS.

"But why are you leaving? We can play some other game if you want to! What about Princess Leia in the gold bikini?" River shouted after him.

The Doctor turned around and stared at her, stopping for a split second, then taking a few quick strides back, facing her very close.

"Is that why you called me here, professor? To play silly games at my birthday? Is that what this is about?"

"Doctor, what a tone! Is that appropriate?" River pouted, faking hurt. "But to be honest, I didn't really call _you _here," she continued lightheartedly. "I was aiming for an older version but this thing seems to get more and more off by the day... Maybe I'll have to re-calibrate it." She fiddled with a gadget similar to an ordinary pad. "But I'm certainly not afraid of trying new things, and that sure is a nice... suit you've got there", she finished, leaning over and shamelessly eyeing the Doctor's bum.

The Doctor just stared at her, the comment making his body more rigid than a weeping angel being very closely monitored.

River cocked an eyebrow: "What? Oh, come on, don't you remember your 998th?"

When he didn't reply and kept looking like a stone statue, she took a small step towards him, looked at him and clearly very confused she spoke:

"You are unbelievably off track today! No theories, no running, no insane blabbering. Did anything happen to you? Are you drugged? Did you have a body swap?" River started to circle around him while monitoring him closely, looking into his eyes, his ears, his nostrils and squeezing his arms and legs. "You seem physically okay but - oh no, wait - don't tell me you've been having a Bergman marathon again! Last time that happened you were paralyzed by existential angst for weeks!"

A very small smile presented itself in the corner of the Doctor's mouth.

"No, I promise you I haven't been watching The Seventh Sail. Not in quite some time, actually. I seem to find the theme of that movie very disturbing nowadays. But now, professor Song, you'll have to excuse me."

He snapped his fingers to open the TARDIS door. He was half way in when River grabbed his shoulder:

"Doctor? I was trying to ask what's wrong."

She was all serious now, there wasn't a single trace of the earlier smirkyness on her face.

The Doctor turned around to face her, his hand still resting on the TARDIS' door frame. He bit his lip, then spoke:

"I'm very sorry, I do think your intentions are good, professor, but I really can't stand any company today, especially not the company of someone that I hardly know."

River's face fell a little. She looked at him, then started rummaging through her bag, eventually pulling out her TARDIS shaped diary. She flipped through the pages, watched him, flipped through a few more, watched him again. Eventually, she closed the book.

When she spoke again, her voice was calm.

"You're traveling alone these days, aren't you, Doctor?"

"Yes. Yes, I am."

"How come?"

"'I... haven't found anyone interested in traveling with me."

River watched him in silence.

"What happened to your last companion, then?" she said, not letting go of his gaze.

"She..." he swallowed, "... um, she, she became like me. No, she didn't become like me, she actually became _me_. And eventually sort of died from it. I... couldn't help her. "

"Who was she?"

"Her name was Donna Noble. She was brilliant. Absolutely brilliant." He looked down.

River Song turned him around so that he was facing her. She put her index finger under his chin, turning his face upwards. He still tried to avoid her eye, watching the sky rather than her. River took his face between her hands, gently forcing him to look at her, smiled and spoke:

"Yes, of course she was. And yes, she deserved a better end. But no, you could not have prevented what happened. It was not your fault."

She paused.

"I think you should be looking for an other companion, sweetie."

"I think I should be traveling alone for a while."

"I really don't think you should."

River Song rose on her toes and placed a kiss on the Doctor's forehead. He closed his eyes to the sensation, it bringing back a lot of forgotten memories. He couldn't take much of it though, and when her lips lingered on his forehead a second too long he cleared his throat and withdrew. River took the hint, smiled a little and sneaked her hand into his. She kept holding his hand while waiting for him to speak.

"It seems like I can't cope with any company anymore," he said. "I'm afraid about what I might do. Professor Song, I am so sorry, but I will have to ask you to leave. I don't want you to get hurt because of me."

He closed his eyes, unfortunately remembering very well what happened last time they met.

"That's River to you," she said, squeezing his hand. "And, Doctor, apart from me thinking you shouldn't be alone these days, there is actually something else here that I think you would find interesting," she said. "Do you see that?" River pointed down to the shore.

The Doctor turned his head, and even from a distance, what laid by the water's edge was a very odd sight. Buried by half in the sand, was a rock. The large stone was beautifully green, something like a mix between emerald and granite. Very appealing material, the sun reflected in the shiny surface and it seemed to almost sparkle.

But the rock... also had legs. And arms.

The limbs were flailing helplessly, the hands digging in the sand and the feet kicking, as if they were trying to free themselves from their very strange prison.

"Doctor," River said, "aren't you the slightest bit interested in what that is?"

"Yes. Of course I am. But most things I touch these days seem to... vanish, or disintegrate and die. I should probably keep away from the whole of existence for a while. I don't think I should interfere here."

"It look like it needs help. When somebody calls for help, the Doctor always answers. Doesn't he hear those cries anymore?"

"He does. I do. Of course I do. But I'm not sure he should listen. Unfortunately, these days it seems like he's adding pain to the universe rather than soothing it.

"Please," River said, once again grabbing his hand, "Please, Doctor, come with me. We'll make this trip together. You're good, you _are_! I promise I will keep you good, as good as you can be, as good as you are. I will not abandon you, I will not allow you to be anything but good. "

She gently tugged at his hand. "Allons-y?"

The Doctor watched her in silence for what felt like an eternity.

Then something happened to his face. What looked like the shadow of a small smile started to play in the corner of his mouth. Soon, it spread to his eyes and a second later his face lit. In fact, it split into a wide, toothy grin as he finally made the decision to accept her silent request for his faith in her.

He squeezed her hand tight.

"Okay then, River Song: allons-y!"

Still hand in hand, River and the Doctor walked towards the strange rock, but came to a surprised halt when they realized the hands was clearly telling them to, well, fuck off. The Doctor looked utterly skeptical while he pulled out his screwdriver and started sonicing the rock.

"I don't get any readings," he said, bending down to have a closer look at the rock. He held out his arm, staying on what he considered a safe distance from the unknown object. "But there is something... I can't really see..." He leaned in closer to the being, and when he did, one of its hands got hold of his fringe.

"Ow!" He yelled as the hand pulled him close to the rock, pushing his face into it. The Doctor tried to pull away, but the hand tugged at his hair, keeping him close to the hard surface. When it didn't let go he brusquely soniced it, causing the arm to spasm, but it didn't let go.

"Stop it, you're hurting it!" River said. "It's probably just scared!" She took the right hand and patted it, the hand grabbing her wrist and holding onto it as if it was clinging on to dear life.

"Hurting _it_? What about my forehead? I've never had hair this nice before, I'd like to keep it, thank you very much!"

Still being held in a very undignified position against the rock, the Doctor tried a new approach, the diplomatic one:

"Hello? Can you hear me, ey? I would very much like you to let go of me, dear rock, if that's possible!". He tapped the rock to see if it would somehow reply.

"It doesn't exactly have ears, sweetie", River said, patting his shoulder and putting her hand in her pocket, pulling out a pen and a pad.

The Doctor looked dumbfounded as River gently opened the fist that clung to her wrist, handing it the pen. As soon as she did, the other hand let go of the Doctors fringe and reached out, gripping in the air, as if it was anticipating the paper. She gave the pad to the rock, and in the shaky letters of the blind, it wrote:

SOMEBODY TOOK THE HEAD

"Somebody took the head?" The Doctor looked astonished. "Really? Where did they go?"

"Still no ears," River pointed out.

The Doctor started tapping the rock again, this time in an uneven rhythm. River watched him in disbelief.

"Morse alphabet," the Doctor explained. "_Could_ have worked."

WERE DOWNSTAIRS ITS DARK I CANT SEE HEAR SOMEBODY SPEAK

The hand had started writing again.

PLEASE HELP

"Dark and downstairs, ey? Unfortunately, I think I know what it hints at," the Doctor said, his eyes a little darker than before. "Have no idea exactly where or how to get there, though," he added. "But we'll find out." He jumped to his feet, brushed the dust off his knees and prepared to leave.

"We should bring the rest of it", River said.

"Well, even though I _am_ very clever, unfortunately I'm not very strong."

"This edition is certainly skinny," River smirked, "lucky for you I've never fancied, nor needed, a buff".

She pulled out a device from her pocket, a rod not very different from the Doctor's screwdriver. She pointed it at the rock, flicked her hand a little, and the rock shrank to one-fifth size. She picked it up, and put it into her pocket.

The Doctor just stared at her, and at the rod, and back at her again. Then his face split into a wide grin. "Brilliant. Just brilliant! You are amazing, Professor Song, you know that?" he said. "But how did you do that? What is it? Silurian? No, no, wait, I think I recognize it... Let me see it!" He eagerly tried to get it out of her hand, but she snatched it away from him.

"Not yet!" she said, smiling at this familiar curiosity, recognizing it from the older versions of him. "Let's just say that I got it on my wedding night. It's just a little something my husband collected from, well, the suit he wore for the occasion."


	3. Tumbling Down the Rabbit Hole

**Interlude  
****Space: **Unknown.  
**Time: **Unknown.

It was dark. In fact, it was darker than he had ever experienced before. As if that wasn't enough, this darkness was also different. It wasn't like the kind of pitch black that he'd seen visiting the countryside in February where there were no lights but the stars, no, this was more like he'd been dipped in black paint. This darkness felt almost like a substance, reminding him of water, only that you could breathe in it - thank god for that.

He couldn't really move, either. Strangely enough, it felt like he was tied to something that carried him fast forward, maybe a mule or a donkey. Interesting, that choice of reference, since he'd never even been riding a horse. But he supposed this was what it felt like, bobbing up and down. Rory Williams found it quite... intriguing, this situation. But having traveled with the Doctor for over four years now, he, Rory the Roman, Roranicus Pondicus, had gotten used to being entangled in these extremely weird situations. And besides, things always worked out. Mysteries got solved! The Doctor won the battle! He got back to the future! Amy still loved him!

At least, that was what he tried to tell himself as he bobbed forward.

* * *

**Tumbling Down the Rabbit Hole  
****Space: **A street of less means in New New York at New Earth  
**Time: **A little later, or maybe – probably - at the same time as that morning recently referred to.

When arriving to his destination the Eleventh Doctor, much to his surprise, found himself in a water puddle, face down. The most questionable part of the interesting choice of landing spot was not the moist, but the fact that he seemed to have come down without his vehicle. As he lifted his head out of the puddle and took a quick look around, the answer was right there. Behind him the TARDIS was neatly parked, although the front door stood wide ajar.

"I _have _to fix that door hinge," he muttered, slowly rising onto his feet. "The vortex turbulence is really bad this time a year."

The Doctor shook the muddy water out of his hair and pulled out his screwdriver to sonic his blazer dry. When he had cleaned himself up a little, he checked the surroundings. It looked like he had hit the spacetime target fairly good, he was most definitely in New New York, but instead of landing at the New Times Square as he intended, he had turned up in a street of less means. The street corners held huge piles of garbage that reeked of rotten food, and dirty water was leaking from unidentified trash. The paving was cracked and peppered with holes and the brick buildings were old and shady, many of the windows lacked glass. Between the houses laundry had been hung out to dry, the white sheets and shirts were slowly waving in the light breeze. The ground floor of most of the buildings held little shops presenting a modest range of articles, most of them looking dusty and old. Apart from the flying vehicles floating by high in the sky, it looked much like a scene from Earth's 1930's Brooklyn, the Doctor noticed, and yes, he was right: to his left he spotted a sign that said New Guernsey Street.

The New Guernsey Street, though, very unlike Guernsey Street, laid strangely empty and quiet. There wasn't a single sign of anything living around here. The Doctor had a closer look in the window of one of the small shops, studying a piece of what might be some kind of meat on display. It looked strangely out of date, dry and shrunken. He scanned the street once again. Nothing was moving or making a sound. Apart from the gentle breeze that made the old shop sign croak a little over his head, there wasn't a sound.

The Doctor started to walk back to the TARDIS, wanting to make another attempt for The New Times Square. But as he opened the door, the eerie silence was ripped apart by a strange, high pitched sound. The Doctor turned around, and was met by the sight of a gang of five young cats that came raging round a corner. Their little voices formed a choir of very unusual and unpleasant tones that the Doctor had never heard before, it wasn't exactly the miaowing sound of your ordinary house kitten. The cats also seemed oddly humanoid; they were running on their hind legs, some of them carrying what looked like very small pistols in their free paws.

The cat mob ran straight to the window next to the Doctor, not really taking any notice of him and while still screaming, they smashed the window and started to drag out what seemed to be something that, with a lot of good will, could be interpreted as potatoes.

"Hello?" said the Doctor, a little bit surprised, "may I ask what you think you are doing?"

A large, grey cat, apparently their leader, turned around and hissed fiercely, pointing its little gun at the Doctor, who jumped and threw his hands in the air:

"Well, now, kitty, don't shoot an old man! "

"Well, then, old man, don't question people's right to eat", the cat snarled, threatening to pull the trigger. "Smithers! Chris! Brannigan! Get your paws going! The police is gonna be here soon enough!" The cat shouted over its shoulder, keeping her eyes locked on the Doctor.

"Or..." the cat continued suspiciously, "are _you _police? I gotta say you look more like a uni professor than a cop, but you can't really know these days." She hissed, and flashed her teeth to the Doctor.

"No, no, no police, I assure you. If you would consider lowering that gun I will introduce myself."

The cat reluctantly lowered her gun a little, as did the Doctor with his hands.

"Okay then, kitty, let's talk like civilized citizens," he said, looking a little resentful. He adjusted his bow-tie and straightened his hair.

"I'm not a civilized citizen anymore," the grey cat snarled. "There is no use for being 'civilized' when people are starving, do you think there is, Mr. Fair-hair?"

"Oh dear, starving? Really? But I haven't seen anybody around. Where are all of these people in need, then?"

"You're really not from around here, are you?"

"No, no, I think I would call myself fairly alien, I would," the Doctor said, trying to lower his hands but quickly rose them again when the grey cat hissed at the attempt.

"They're all out looking for work, or trying to sell some of their belongings, of course," a red tabby cat said. "Isn't that what you would do, if you were out of money? And this has been going on for quite a while now, you know. Ever since the last huge stock market crash, with the burstin' of the teleporting bubble an' all, we've been starving! Ain't been no one there for us at all, so we decided to go out find the food for us and our parents ourselves."

"Yeah, that's us, but you still haven't told us who you are?" the grey cat asked, eyeing the Doctor suspiciously.

"I'm the Doctor. Yes, yes, Doctor who, no, there's no who, it's just the Doctor," he said, rolling his eyes as he forestalled the question.

"What do you mean, 'just the Doctor'? There's no such thing." One of the other cats, an entirely black one, had come up to them. It was carrying a large sack of something that at least used to be eatable, and while chewing on a piece of outdated meat, it spoke for the first time. "Hey man, you gotta be _some _kinda doctor. Are you a... spin doctor? Is that what you are? Are you lobbying for his ideas?"

"What? Who?"

"Look!" an other, smaller black cat shouted, "Hey, guys, look at his vehicle! Don't you see what color it is?"

"Oh, shit. It's the same blue. Oh, shit..."

"Yeah, yeah, it is! And did you see how it came here? Didn't you see it _spinning _through the air before landing?"

The grey cat had thrown a look across its shoulder, and by the sight of the TARDIS it snarled and aggressively pointed its gun at the Doctor again, who once more threw his hands in the air. The animal, now empowered by the other four walking close behind it while hissing fiercely, forced the Doctor to take a couple of steps backwards, which eventually made him hit a wall. There he stood with his hands in the air, trying to defend himself.

"For who? For what? My little furry clad friends, now you're are all wrong! I don't work for any agenda but mine – oh, well, maybe River Song's, at Friday nights – but, um, I really can't see what's going on here. Who is this '_he_'?"

"Oh, come on, who d'you take us for?" the tabby cat snarled. "D'you really think we're that stupid? Nobody can _not _know who he is! He's the most famous swindler on the entire planet!"

"Sorry to disappoint you, but I try to be a little less involved in the events of the universal crime scene these days," the Doctor said. "Since my earlier adventures left some, um, let's say... _unfavourable footprints, _in history, I nowadays try to keep a low profile when travelling around, so let's just say that I'm nobody, really, just a traveller who happened to come to New New York looking for a missing friend of mine. Oh, by the way, have you seen him? Late twenties, blond, pouty nose. Seen anything like that?"

"So, Mr. Nobody, you want to make yourself less visible to the authorities," the grey cat said. "That's definitely something we can relate to." She lowered her gun a little, but did not let go of it. "This buddy of yours that you're trying to find, what did she or he do? We might be able to help."

"Do? Oh, he's done a lot of things, actually, the most remarkable I would say is that he was, um, well, _plastic _for almost 2000 years, but he also helped rebooting the universe, overtake a pirate ship, rising an army against the Silence and he's actually, also, well, my father-in-law and-"

"You're in a gang with your _father-in-law_?" the grey cat asked, looking very doubtful.

"Well, yes, gang, if you put it that way, I suppose, yes, it's a little complicated, though-"

"Oh, cut the crap, I'm not _that _interested in how people want to form their families and other bonds, but you're most def no cop, at least," she said, "those kinda constellations isn't really the ways of an officer."

"Nope, no police, I assure you," the Doctor said. "Just a traveller a little of track. A mad man in a box, they say sometimes." He grinned widely at the mentioning of this. "I really like that title," he added, mostly to himself, "Should have it painted outside the TARDIS."

"Okay, then, mad man, Mr. Nobody, Doctor, whatever," the grey cat said, finally lowering her gun. "I'm Sasha. This is Chris and Brannigan -" Sasha gave a little nod at the two tabby cats, one red, one striped, "and over there is Smithers and Jess." The latter where the two entirely black cats, Jess being the smaller one of them. "I think we can help you find your friend."

"It should be kinda easy," Brannigan, the striped tabby cat, said. "We have a hide out down under here, where we can keep track of what he does, there are a lot of devices and-"

Brannigan didn't have time to finish his sentence before a teenager clad in a skin tight, shiny purple bodysuit, came flick-flacking round the corner. The long, blond ponytail whipped as she swirled past the cats and the Doctor, grabbed poor Brannigan and swept away with the cat.

"And ten points goes to... New USA!" the girl shouted happily while she turned cart wheels down the street, somehow still managing to hold on to the cat. Brannigan's angst ridden meowing echoed between the buildings and as soon as the other cats had gotten over the initial shock they ran screaming after the girl down the street.

The Doctor, though, stood flabbergasted and blinked a couple of times, not really believing what he had just witnessed. He made a grimace when he heard the cats, who had now rounded a corner, screaming and fighting. But before he had collected himself enough to even start to think about interfering the cats returned, seeming relatively unhurt.

"It's getting worse," Sasha said. "Nowadays even the most harmless ones are pretty bad," she continued, licking a wound on her paw.

"Excuse me, but if you have any information on the subject of what that might have been, would you mind giving it to me?" the Doctor said, still not believing what on New Earth he just saw.

"'Gymnastics'," Chris said, a growl threatening to break out of her throat. "She was patched with 'gymnastics'. One of the more harmless mood controllers, still a bit out of control, if you're asking me."

"Ooooooh." the Doctor said, finally getting at least two percent of what was going on. He closed his eyes and tried to remember something that had happen a _very _long time ago. "What year is this, again?" he continued.

"4. 999. 999. 993," Jess said. "You _are_a bit slow, aren't you?"

"Oh, okay." the Doctor bit his lip. "I'm very sorry, then. I don't quite remember, it's extremely blurry now, but if I'm not mistaken... Well, about sixty years isn't that long, I suppose. But, um, this_ he_ that you mentioned before this, um, sporty catnapper came by, does this he have anything to do with the mood controllers?"

"Of course he does," little Jess said, "he's the one dealing the shit! That's why Sasha was so pissed at you, she believed that you were working for him, with that blue box and all."

"I wouldn't be surprised if he'd seen you friend, too," Brannigan filled in. "The guy controls pretty much anything that happens around here. If your friend isn't extremely street smart, the risk that he was captured by the guy is pretty high, I'd say."

"Well..." said the Doctor, wincing a little when he thought about that 'street smart' wasn't exactly the first description that came to mind when one thought about Rory Williams. "I suppose I should go see him, then. Do you know how to get there?"

"Yes, we certainly do," Brannigan said. "There's a problem, though," he continued, "you don't really seem to fit in the door way."

The cat gave a hint to a pretty small hole in the street, that seemed to lead down to eternity.

The Doctor looked at the opening.."Well, yes, that could have been a problem about a month ago," he said. "But since I'm so extremely clever, I knew that I, some day, would get some benefits from hanging out with that ever so annoying, Captain Talbot Breech in that Teseleca." he said and pulled out his screwdriver, looking very pleased with himself.

"What's that?" little Jess asked, climbing his leg a little trying to have a look.

"This, little kitten, used to be a very usual sonic screwdriver," the Doctor said, "but I can now proudly present: the screwdriver version 11.2!"

"Not that I can tell the difference from version 11.1," Sasha said, "but what does this new version do?"

"This gadget – a very precious of mine – does now, thanks to Capt. Breech, contain not only 12.367 functions, but 12.368. Let me demonstrate the latest addition!"

By that, the Doctor pointed the screwdriver at himself, and whirred it. In a blink, he had shrunken to about 12 inches height, him now being eye level with the cats.

"Function 12.368: miniaturization ray!" the Doctor said, beaming with proudness.

"Wow!" little Jess said, looking very impressed. "Can I try? Can I at least see?"

Then, it all happened very fast. As the Doctor intended to try showing Jess the full power of the miniaturization ray the shadow cast from a hoovering vehicle fell down on them. The vessel hung in the middle of the air for a moment, soundlessly observing the cats and the Doctor, of whom nobody took notice of the vehicle. It was not before Chris turned her head to lick her back that she saw it:

"The police!" she shrieked, her voice high pitched and scared.

At the sound of Chrises' cry the vehicle took a deep dive at them, zoning in on the cats at a very alarming speed. In a split second, the cats had all jumped down the small hole, the last one being Sasha, throwing herself so violently at the Doctor that just before tumbling down the hole, he lost hold of his screwdriver.

Then it all went black.


	4. Roses are Red and Salesmen are Blue

(Just a Humble Note From the Author)**  
**Hi guys, I can see that a lot of people are reading this, but no one really comments... Makes me a little bit of a sad panda, I must say. Please take a moment to review, it's greatly appreciated. Okay thanx allons-y chapter four yeay!

* * *

**Roses are Red and Salesmen are Blue**

**Space: **The Catacombs of New New York, inside a lair.  
**Time: **Some kind of morning. Maybe around ten-ish.

In a small room, pretty dark, shady and from floor to ceiling stuffed with all kind of things, a very large person sat behind a desk, deeply engaged in what looked like a huge amount of paper work. He was muttering to himself, looking very annoyed, and every now and then he shouted out little orders to a young, black haired woman who stood sorting mood controlling patches into different boxes with labels such as "Happy happy", "Honesty" and "Sleep". The woman's eyes were empty and her movements restricted by an iron ring laid around her neck. The ring were attached to a long chain attached to the wall behind her. When having a closer look at her neck, you would see that she herself was patched with Obedience.

"Alice, dear, could you come over here with my coffee?" The large man spoke to the girl but didn't look up from his papers.

"Yes, Mr. Maldovar, in a minute," the girl answered.

Dorium Maldovar got his coffee, but it didn't put him in a better mood. This time of year was terrible: first, there was the paper work that had to be done before the end of December, and this year, the authorities had shortened the time span for it to be finished from three to two weeks. On top of that, people where coming from all sorts of place trying to sell him the weirdest things, that had no value at all for him as a salesman. And this phenomena had grown even bigger since the New Great Depression had broken out, which made him_ really_ tired. A couple of years ago, things had been different, back then people brought good gods to him to sell. But still, every now and then, a diamond could get around, so he couldn't close down the entire business. And the mood controllers part still did really good, he had to admit.

A couple of minutes passed, the room was all quiet, except for the low rustling from Alice's chains. Dorium made some grunting sounds, clearly annoyed with the paper work.

Then there was a knock on the door. A small, hesitant knock, that Dorium didn't really hear, at first. But the knocker knocked again, and Dorium sighed and turned to Alice:

"Alice, dear. A customer."

Alice got the door, and a very thin, ragged man entered the room. His eyes seemed hollow, and he was very pale, even for the season. Dorium put his pen down, put on an artificial smile, folded his hands and addressed the man:

"Good morning, sir, what can I do for you?"

The thin man put down a large pail on the table. Dorium spun the bucket around to study the label.

"Chlorine? Really? Are you expecting me to buy it? For what? What use could I possibly have for this substance?"

The thin man bowed his head, holding his hat in his hand.

"Well, you could probably sell it to someone, I heard they lack chlorine down in New Alabama, you know, they produce a lot of cotton but they can't make proper sheets without bleach, they're exporting to New New England but upstate they refuse to buy unless the sheets are really white. Can't you try and sell it to them? Please?"

"And what are you expecting to get for this chlorine?"

"I really need a batch of Forget... You see, Myrah, my youngest, she has cancer."

"Luckily enough, I've just gotten a new delivery that included Forget. I'll give you three patches of Forget for this bucket of bleach."

"But, sir, we're five in the family... and they don't last that long. My husband worked very hard for this bucket, he got it instead of a salary last month, and I had ten patches in mind..."

"I'm afraid, sir, that four is all I can give you, and then I am being kind hearted. This is no charity you know, this is strictly business. Take into consideration that this chlorine is most likely useless, so you should be very pleased with the good deal I'm offering."

The thin man just bowed his head and nodded in acceptance.

"You may go over to Alice and pick your forget", Dorium said, nodding over to the young girl at the shelves. The thin man stumbled over to the boxes, where Alice handed him five small patches. He turned to Dorium, giving him a subservient nod as a thank you, and left the room.

"Alice!" Dorium called, "put this bucket on the top shelf, we won't be needing it for now. Maybe I'll try and sell it to someone less intelligent, later on."

While Alice executed the order, the room fell quiet and Dorium returned to his paper work. But he hadn't written more than a single line before it knocked on the door again. This time, it was a very intense thumping that didn't stop.

"Alice? The door, please," Dorium called as he tried to focus on last months invoices.

Alice opened the door, and was almost knocked over by three children rushing into the room, practically bouncing off the walls. Half a step behind them came a man, probably their father, with a wide smile on his face.

"Yes yes yes, _hello_ Mr. Maldovar! How are we today? No no, don't tell, let me guess: wonderful! How could anyone be anything else this blessed day! Oh, to me the world is just a bliss as usual, thank you for asking, that's very polite of you, I feel fantastic! I was thinking, do you happen to have anything left of that fantastic batch of Energy that I got one hundred and fifty patches of last week? If you try them with Bliss, I tell you, that is surely a experience! I happened to use double patches once, they were glued together, and look, look at me now! Bursting with energy! And the children! I've never seen them this happy! Energy is better than Happy happy, I tell you! You should stop selling Happy Happy, and go over to a combined Energy/Bliss-patch instead!"

Dorium had covered his eyes with his hand. "Alice?" He called out faintly. "Would you please help Mr. Anderson here with his weekly supply of Energy?"

The children were rummaging around the room, climbing shelves, flipping furniture upside down, closing and opening the door, running around in circles.

"Hello fat blue man" shouted the smallest girl, bouncing up and down, "why are you so fat and blue? Why are you so fat and blue? Hello, mister? Why are you so fat and blue?"

"He's fat because he ate too much sandwiches with bananas and bacon! And he's blue because his people, the salesmen, their power is in the blue! Mr. Maldovar told me that himself once, didn't you Mr. Maldovar, sure you did, didn't you? If you lost your blue, you wouldn't be able to buy and sell things no more, am I right, am I right, am I right?" her brother shouted from the other side of the room, while dangling from a top shelf.

"Am I right? Am I right?" he kept shouting until Dorium uncovered his eyes and said

"Yes, little one, you're right, I'd loose my management powers, yes, that's right. That would be fatal. Unless I of course died from the exploding of my eardrums first."

"Blue man, bacon man! Blue man, bacon man! Blue man without blue is useless bacon man!" The middle sister sang loudly as she tied two New India silk ties together to use as a jump rope.

"What can you offer me for the Energy?"

"Not much, I have these buttons, but they're made of ivory from Earth! Real ivory! Over a thousand years old! One of my relatives picked them up! It was fetched by my great great great great great great great great great great great great great great great great great great great great great great great great great great gre-"

"I get it, I get it! You can have the Energy, just give me the buttons, and if you don't mind, could you please leave as soon as possible, I'm trying to work here."

"Thank you, thank you, Dorium, as mannerly as ever! Come now, Fox and Marita! Get down from the shelf, it's time to go! Go go go! Fowley! Stop swinging in the lamp! it's time to leave for today! Say goodbye to the nice Mr. Maldovar and let's go, let's go, let's go! I want to try out that new roller coaster at the fun park as soon as we've patched up with more Energy, don't you want to try it out as well, don't you? Sure you do! Come one, come one, little ones, let's leave!"

The enigmatic dad and his children rushed out of the room. Dorium could hear the echo of little Fowley singing "useless bacon, blue useless, bacon blue" down the corridor long after they left. Having recovered a little, he uncovered his eyes and asked Alice for an aspirin. Then he returned to his papers.

But once again it knocked. This time on the door frame, since Alice hadn't closed the door. This visitor didn't wait for Dorium to accept her request for entrance, she just stepped right in up to his desk.

"Hello, sir" she said.

"Hello, ma'am. If you don't have anything very rare to present to me, I'm not interested, today is a very busy day. And I'm out of Spiritual, if that's what you're looking for", Dorium replied, but didn't look up.

"I do have something here that's interesting, I promise you."

Dorium sighed.

"I hope for your own sake that what you have brought to me is something particularly good. So far today I've pretty much given away my goods, there's no profit in working that way, and this is a business, not a church, do I have to repeat that?"

"Have a look. I promise you won't be disappointed."

Dorium reluctantly looked up from his paper work.

He was surprised. The sight that met him was indeed rare, something he 'd never seen through all of his years as a business man. It was a head, just a single head, attached to a piece of emerald green rock.

"Oh dear, what on New Earth is that?"

"I found it on the beach", the woman said proudly. "Thought you might have a use for it, you who're selling and buying and buying and selling the most extraordinary things. I will give you a good deal: I'm just asking for a box of Sanity."

"Seems like it could be interesting, indeed, this business offer, but what is it that you brought me? It seems to be alive, although that doesn't seem possible!" Dorium rose from behind the desk and came round it to have a closer look. The head eyed him nervously.

"It's fascinating! Very fascinating. It looks like it's able to communicate, at least on a basic level. But what _is_ it?"

"Excuse me, I-I-I'm not a it, actually". The head cleared its throat. "I am from a... oh well, a galaxy far, far away."

"Oh! We do speak! How very interesting. What galaxy did you say? Far Far Away? Where is that one?"

"Um, no, it's called the Milky Way, actually. Sorry, I was trying to be funny, but I suppose, most likely, we don't have the same frame of reference", the head said.

"But that's impossible. The Milky Way imploded a thousand years ago."

"Yes, well, things aren't really always like they seem to be. I, for instance, also used to have a job, a girlfriend, an apartment and oh, how could I forget: a body."

"Sir, this is all very interesting. But, sir, if you have all that, I suspect you also have a name?"

"Of course I do. I'm Rory. Rory Williams."

* * *

Two hours later, Rory Williams were driving Dorium Maldovar totally, insanely mad.

"Would you mind being quiet! I will not tell you another time, Mr. Williams!" Dorium roared, but Rory didn't pay attention.

"La, la, la, la, won't ever shut up, won't close my mouth, will not be quiet, bla, bla-"

"I cannot take another word from you!"

Dorium sat behind his desk, shaking with anger, his usually blue face had turned an alarming shade of purple, as he was trying to force Rory to shut up.

"No, Mr. Blue Man, I won't shut up, I promise you, I will never close this mouth until you bring me the Doctor! Um, you know what? Actually, I can tell the story! Yes, yes, that I will do. I will tell you about how I met my wife, that's a long, long story, yes I will. It started back in 1995, when she invited me over for a game of hide-and-seek-"

"I SAID QUIET!" Dorium bellowed.

Rory, having been talking like this, loud and with no sense of meaning for the last thirty-five minutes was getting pretty tired of this himself. But he couldn't really think of any strategy to cope with this... somewhat unfamiliar situation, the whole missing a body and being attached to a rock-thingy was pretty new to him. Since his plan A – trying to beg Dorium on his bare knees – (that he didn't have, when you come to think about it, maybe that was why he failed?) didn't work out at all, Dorium considering him way too valuable to let go, he had to come up with a plan B. Unfortunately, he didn't really have a plan B, which led to plan C, which was simply annoying his captioner.

Rory Williams proceeded with plan C.

"Sorry? Can't hear you, really," he said, "where was I? Well, Amy, Amelia Jessica Pond, her full name is, invited me over to play this game, hide-and-seek, as I said, are you familiar with the rules? If you're not, I'll explain them to you, well? No? Yes? Yes. The game is played like this: one person starts to count, while the other goes into hiding-"

"Alice!" Dorium called, having put his fingers in his ears, trying to shut out the sound of Rory's voice. "Take the head down to the vault and lock him up there, please, place him in the strongbox behind May."

"And darling," he added a moment later, seemingly a little calmer, "you will take care of her daily routine as well, won't you, sugar?"

Dorium moved over to where Alice stood and unlocked the large padlock that kept her chained to the wall. Without a word or protest, Alice went straight over to Dorium's desk and scooped up Rory's head. When she had also taken a small box of mood controllers she mechanically left the office, neatly closing the door behind her.

Dorium returned to his paper work, even though he could still hear Rory's protests echo down the corridor. He threw an eye an the large monitors that was placed beside his desk, the screens showed pretty much every single corner of the catacombs underneath his office where he kept his stashes of different things. It was also good to be able to keep an eye on what was happening down there - you could never be safe enough in times like these. Dorium sighed. He really hoped that the black marked would improve, preferably very soon. It wasn't really lucrative to run a business under conditions like these, it bothered him but he couldn't do much about it. Hopefully he could at least sell that head for a considerable amount of money. He glanced at the monitor once again and saw Alice, carrying Rory's head, unlocking the last iron door.

Just as he was about to have a closer look to make sure she used the right key, the monitor started to flicker. Dorium muttered and hit the old screen, sometimes that could help. He was getting pretty used to this, as it happened at least two times a day. The main reason that he hadn't gotten it fixed already was that it was such a boring thing to pay for. Oh, how he hated to pay for boring things! If he was to pay for something it had to be a great buy – he was a salesman, for gods sake.

Dorium Maldovar pouned the monitor once again with no luck, it kept flickering and blacked out every second frame. He grunted, took a sip of his coffee and returned to his work.


	5. Goodbye and Thanks for All the Yams

**Interlude  
Space:** Under Dorium's lair, outside the last iron door

To be able to open the last door, Alice had put Rory down on the floor. From where he stood – well, that choice of verb could be discussed – his view was very limited. After Alice had taken him down the cellar he had been quiet, since this strange young girl didn't seem to take much notice of him. Maybe she was a robot? She might just be a robot. Rory was a very chastened man these days, nothing seemed to surprise him anymore. He sometimes wondered if being a father might would, that was pretty much the last thing he could imagine that he hadn't been through, yet.

Alice managed to unlock the door, and when it swung open, a fathomless roar rose from within. Even though he was used to most things nowadays, Rory swallowed. This situation was uncommon because he couldn't really use the Doctor approved method of handling most problems – running -, the only thing he could do was hope for that the monster didn't to appreciate stone for dessert.

He saw Alice enter the small cave that hid behind the iron door, and as she pulled it fully ajar he saw another girl in her early twenties chained to the wall, guarding a strongbox. The girl was raging, a growl arose from her throat as Alice approached her. Alice seemed to be totally unaffected by the rampant woman, actually patting her head a little while she patched her with Rage.

"She's held here to guard," Rory thought and swallowed. "Guard what...?"

"Dear May," Alice said, in a weird and emotionless voice, "hopefully, one day, everything will be fine." She stroked May's hair, twining a lock of her hair between her fingers.

In a blink, Alice gave May a peck on the cheek before quickly scooping up Rory – and locking him into the strongbox.

* * *

**Goodbye and Thanks For All the Yams  
****Space: **In a decadent club in New New York  
**Time: **Early afternoon. (People are out of a job and are therefore allowed to drink in the afternoon, aight?)

The people of New New York were generally positive individuals. The citizens, as well as their namesakes from five billion years earlier, were famous for even in times like these - the era of the New Great Depression - trying to keep up the good spirit. New Brooklyn housed hundreds and hundreds of 'joy clubs' which was bars where the workers met up with the rascals and thieves and all sorts of reprobated souls. These places were happy and warm, the owners didn't leave anybody out in the cold.

Alexander Schwartz, one of the resident dancers of the bar The Last Centurion (the name based on a legend that had been around, well, practically since the dawn of mankind, people thought) was about to start his shift. He hadn't been doing this for very long, only a couple of months since after he'd been fired from a factory where components to teleporters were made. He didn't mind, though, he'd never really liked working that much.

Sandy considered himself a free spirit, he didn't really mind being out of a job, in fact, he enjoyed life so much more now than half a year ago. Being young and without a family to support, he gladly spent a couple of hours down at The Last Centurion every night, to get some food and maybe a couple of coins. He really did okay now, having his own show at the bar, performing under the name of Sandy Cotton Candy.

His only actual concern with being out of a job was that he couldn't get fish. Sandy loved fish. He was aware that nowadays nobody seemed to get a real dish served, and certainly not fish, but that couldn't keep him from dreaming of grilled cod, smoked salmon and marinated salmon. He was so tired of the variety of … mashed vegetables that seemed to be the most common food around here these days.

Sandy finished his snack - dinner would be later - and today's snack was just the said mashed jams, put in a little jar. He swallowed the last spoonful, sighed, and put the container aside. He had a couple of minutes left until he was on.

Sandy went backstage, stretching a little, flexing his abs. Through the curtains, he spotted a particularly handsome man, sitting next to the scene. The guy could obviously see him peeking through the curtains, because he smiled at him: a wide, flirty grin. Sandy winked at him. He hadn't been laid in a while, not since Iris, his ex girlfriend, had broken up with him a couple of weeks ago, and the urge was growing stronger. He could definitely offer some time on playing a little with this dark stranger. He went to the rack where his coat hung, and pulled out a little box that said "Energy" and opened it, only to find that it was empty.

"Oh shit," he muttered, rolling his eyes. "Not today..."

He had a quick look around.

"Hey, Max?" he called for a fellow dancer.

"Yeah?" Max, a tall blond guy in his mid-thirties, turned up in the door frame.

"Do you happen to have any Energy left? I seem to be out of mine," Sandy asked.

"Oh, man, you're always out of it... don't you ever have any money?"

"Sorry, really sorry, but please, I'll get my salary tonight, I'll go to blue and get some more, can I have just another patch from you, please?"

Max sighed, but took out his wallet and handed Sandy a patch of Energy.

"It's my last, man, seriously. You'll have to get me some more for tomorrow. I have a pretty tricky number tomorrow night."

"Yeah, yeah, I will, I promise. Thanks a lot, man! But, um, you don't happen to have any Grace on you, too?" Sandy gave a little nod at the handsome stranger by the stage. "If you know what I mean...?"

"Seriously? That guy? Really? You're crazy..."

"Oh, please, Max, come on! You know there's been a dry spell since Iris left, come on, I know you've got it, don't cock block here!"

Max threw Sandy a look, but handed him a patch of Grace.

"I want it back tomorrow morning," he said, looking like he really didn't believe it was gonna happen.

"I promise! I really do! Thank you, thank you, thank you," Sandy beamed and threw Max a kiss.

Max had heard Sandy say that many times before, but didn't protest anymore and left to get dressed for his own performance. Sandy took a deep breath, and patched himself with the Energy and the Grace. As he felt the effect of the patch flow into his limbs, he straightened his smooth legs, adjusted his ballet suit and hit the stage.

Sandy performed his number spotlessly, having done it may times before. He twisted, and twirled and jumped. He knew he was a charming man, very aware of that the body that God gave him was nothing to be ashamed of. The handsome, dark man in in the audience, was now eyeing him from head to toe, not trying to hide his gaze. Sandy smiled inwardly. Usually, he didn't get involved with the customers around here, he liked the job too much for having any drama at it, but there was something about this mans shining white grin and slightly odd clothing that said that he might be a foreigner, and that could be worth an exception.

He moved smoothly to the music, it being really an art since it was a weird mix of Mozart and New Kraftwerk. The man by the stage kept smirking at him, lifting his glass and winking every time Sandy swept by.

When he had finished his performance, he wasn't at all surprised to find the dark stranger backstage, or, well, in the kitchen. Sandy decided to play it cool - he pretended not to have seen the man at all. He sat down by the bar, waiting for the dinner to arrive. The chef, a large white woman, put down a streaming hot plate of something that was probably at least eatable in front of him. Sandy eyed it suspiciously. He couldn't really tell what it was, although it was certainly not fish, but it did look like something that could be consumed. He put his fork in it, smelling the dish.

"No salmon today either?" he threw at the chef. "I'm gonna have to give you a punishment for this," he added, winking at the woman.

"I don't have any fish either, does that mean that I too can be rewarded with a punishment?"

Sandy spun around on his stool. Behind him, with a wide grin on his face, stood the foreigner that had watched him so closely during his show. "Hello," the man continued. "Lovely performance, I gotta say. And such beautiful calves I haven't seen in the last two hundred centuries. Lucky for me that I calibrated the vortex manipulator wrong."

Sandy grinned back, no longer attempting to play it cool.

"Alexander Schwartz," he said, shaking the foreigners hand. "Or Sandy, if that suits you better."

"Hello, Sandy, I think that suits you, and so does your... suit," the man said, eyeing Sandy's crotch, "the name is Harkness. Captain Jack Harkness."

"Well then, now, Mr. Harkness, you don't look like you're from around here," Sandy said. "Am I right? What brought you here?"

"You're most definitely right, sonny boy, I came to New New York to buy mood controllers, actually, but having a look at the goods present, I could definitely imagine having a little detour around the ballet shelf," Jack said, beaming at Sandy. "And you know what?" he added, leaning in a little closer, "I am looking for Bliss and Stamina."

Sandy smirked.

"Well, then you're lucky, I'm off my shift now and actually, I'm about to go to my dealers to get some new Energy," he said. "Wanna come?"

"Most certainly," Captain Jack answered, smiling and looking Sandy deep in the eye. The innuendo made Sandy blush, which definitely didn't happen very often. Actually, he didn't think it had ever happened before. He was used to be the one making the innuendoes, not receiving them.

Sandy rose from the stool, leaving his still hot plate with the questionable food.

"Please, Captain," he said, putting his coat on, not bothering changing into his civilian clothing, "after you. "


	6. A Fortress Deep and Mighty

_A little note from the author:  
__I think this chapter just popped the story into the category 'T': that is for something bad that escaped River's mouth. Will definitely be M, though, sooner or later, because of the same person. Gotta love a good bad mouth! Please review, people, it's always greatly appreciated, especially when you're writing these looooong stories that keep you awake at night, trying to solve plot knots. Thanks! :)_

* * *

**A Fortress Deep and Mighty, that None May Penetrate.**

**Space: **New Central Park  
**Time: **Still around noon, I suppose, but you can never know for sure, can you?

It was midday in New Central Park. The weather was, as always in late December if no snow had fallen, cold and greyish. This particular year, no Christmas decorations had been put up since the city had decided that it would have been insensitive, considering the current situation for many of its inhabitants. The large Christmas tree had been installed before this act had come into force, though, and now it stood naked and painfully not lit in the middle of the park, serving as a doleful reminder of how bad the times were. As if it wasn't enough, the tree's largest, lowest branches also housed crouching homeless people, some of them had fired up some dry sticks in a desperate attempt to try and keep some body heat. The small seats of fire glowed in the dusky afternoon.

The general gloominess of the park didn't seem to affect River Song and the Tenth Doctor who came walking down a slope hill. They were chatting lively, engaged in a discussion where they didn't seem to agree, slightly mocking each other.

"...it said 'fish'! Look!" River held a small piece of paper in front of the Doctor. "Listen! First, it has written 'ok, she's raging now and I'm scared' and then 'also, I smell fish'.'"

"Yes, and since fish is an animal living in water, that means we should have gone to the harbour! Who would go looking for fish at dry land?" the Doctor said, spreading his arms widely. Then he added, faking hurt: "You should have listened to me, Professor Song, I am famous for happening to be a tiny winey bit brilliant, after all."

The Doctor grinned happily at River. Spending a couple of hours with her had been a great treat to him, who often felt that he lacked an adequate sparring partner when it came to babbling and theorizing. This mysterious Professor Song had certainly put up a good fight every time he spat out some unconsidered argument - he had to watch his mouth carefully before he name dropped or improvised. He couldn't help but teasing her a little about his own greatness, anticipating her next move with high expectations.

"Archeologists always look for fish in parks," River replied while smirking at him. "Water living animals tend to end up there after a couple of million years. You shouldn't always go looking at the most obvious places, sweetie," she finished and patted the Doctors arm.

"But you don't even know if the 'also, I smell fish', means that the head can smell fish in its surroundings, or that the head smells fish itself!" the Doctor argued. "How could you tell? Maybe she or he just this morning happened to choose a pair of socks that hasn't seen a washing machine in a very, very long time!" he continued.

"No," River said, "because if that was the case, you and I by now wouldn't have been able to breathe either – have you forgotten that we have the body? The socks would be on our half, then. It has to mean that the head can smell fish, where ever it is."

"Maybe, but still, more likely to smell sea food when being close to water," the Doctor muttered, and jolted a little as he almost tripped over his own feet. He hadn't realized they had come to a stop and were now facing down in a glade.

"I'm not so sure about that, Doctor," River said, and pointed down the steep hill in front of them.

Down at the meadow, there was a couple of small booths with red and white striped roofs. One of them presented a sign that clearly read: Fresh Sea Foods.

"Well, now, that's finally a usable clue", River said. "Come on!"

"Wait! Hold on!" the Doctor said, grabbing River by the sleeve before she could set off down the slope. "Do you really think the head is in there?" he asked, looking really doubtful.

"Of course not. But it's very obvious, love, when you think about it: the rock said it could smell fish. And this whole town is starving, food in general isn't very common - there is probably only one supplier of raw products around here. A sea food retailer would of course know where to get fish, and the head is probably at that sales person's store," River said while the Doctor's jaw slackened a little.

"Oh, shut that mouth! I also happen to be a tiny bit brilliant!" River took a step closer to the Doctor, now facing him close. She raised a hand to touch his chest, slowly stroking him there. "And please, grow old soon," she pouted, though he could see a hint of laughter in her eye. "You are so annoyingly slow when you're this young."

"Oh, anyone could have figured _that_ out", the Doctor said, trying to save his pride. "And, professor: we'll see who'll be _agonisingly _slow when I'm from _your_ future," he muttered, not very pleased with having been outsmarted.

He sat off down the slope in a feeble attempt to try and take back the lead from her.

"Oh, _my _future. I'll hold you to that, Doctor," River said after him, while hurtling forwards to try and catch up with him. The downhill terrain forced both of them to move quite fast and River's blond curls bobbed animatedly around her head. "Everybody loves a good future!" she shouted. "Don't we all, Doctor?"

That line made the Doctor hold his breath for a moment. When he answered her, it was in a much less cheery voice than before. "Yes, we all do, Professor... But we also love a good yesterday. You have to remember the good yesterdays, that's also important." He paused. "There certainly are a lot of good yesterdays," he added, mostly to himself.

Since the Doctor was half-running down the hill two steps ahead of River, she hadn't sensed the sudden shift of mood in him. While panting a little, trying to keep up with the strides of his long legs, she kept talking to him down the same light hearted banter road their conversation had been going for the past couple of hours."Oh, Doctor, did those yesterdays include someone very _special_ to you, that isn't present anymore?" she said. "If that's so, it's fine, really, I'm not the jealous type."

As he heard that, the Doctor stopped dead in mid-step. He turned on the heel and started at her.

"As a matter of fact, those days did include important people," he snarled. "And they were not only important because I wanted to do bed related activities with them: they were important because they were my friends."

River startled, backing of a little. The Doctor did realize that from her point of view, this had only been a natural continuation of the last hours conversation. He couldn't really expect her to know what he had been through the past year. The anger faded away as fast as it had come over him, and he hesitantly took a few steps uphill, closing the space between them, and cleared his throat before speaking.

"I'm sorry, professor," he said. "I'm very sorry. I didn't mean to... um, I... I think I overreacted a bit here. I... My nerve endings seems to be on fire, these days. I have recently found myself having these uncontrollably outbursts of anger that are quite unexplainable. I'm really sorry."

River watched him in silence.

"Yes, most certainly so," she said, but took his hand. "But you're still kind of fun to be around."

"I figure you would think so, since you are actually a tiny winy bit brilliant yourself, Professor Song," the Doctor said, now smiling a little. The tone in his voice bore a hint of affection.

"That's still River to you, Doctor." River reminded him, smiling.

"Well, then, River," he said, now grinning. "Let's go try the local specialities, shall we?" He stretched out his hand and wiggled his fingers at her. Hand in hand they walked against the small stands in the meadow.

Within a minute, they reached the said Sea Food stand and were met by the sight of a large, grumpy woman that sat in front of a lot of boiling and steaming pots, seemingly having an abundance of food, in spite of the general hard times.

"Hello." The woman greeted them without a trace of enthusiasm. "Today we have shrimp, salmon, cray fish. Make your pick."

"Hello," the Doctor replied, delivering his toothiest grin. "I don't think we want to eat anything today - even though it smells delicious -, we would just like to know where the commodities to these wonderful dishes where acquired."

At that, the large woman behind the counter laughed. "Hey, sonny, do you really think I'll tell you that, just on a whim?"

"You... you wouldn't?" the Doctor said.

"Of course not."

"Okay... so the identity of your retailer is a very precious secret...?"

"Did you hear me say you couldn't know where I get the stuff?" the woman snorted while turning her back to the Doctor and River. She yanked a cabinet door of the wall mounted cupboards open and started rummaging through the small space.

"Okay, no, that's true, you didn't say that..." the Doctor furrowed his brow. "There has to be something else here... Ah, well, of course: what will it take, then?"

"What does information usually take?" the woman said, still shuffling around pots with her back at them.

"A blow job?" River suggested.

The Doctor glanced at her in horror and looked as if he had both this and that to say regarding River's chosen methods of investigation, but the woman behind the counter turned to them and laughed. "The wifey's good, you know, you should listen to her," she said, winking at River.

"She's not my-" the Doctor started, but got interrupted.

"It'll take money, of course," the woman wrapped up the discussion. "I am not going to give away anything for free in a time like this, not even information, but everything of course, has a price. Name yours, and we'll discuss it."

"Oh, well.." the Doctor said, and turned his pockets inside out to see what he could find. A couple of screws turned up, a paper clip and some 17th century Swedish money. He whirred his sonic over the small objects, but nothing happened. He muttered, rolled his eyes, and without a word he handed them over to River, who already held out her palm. "Fine," the Doctor pouted. "You go have all the fun." River smiled, added a couple of unidentifiable metal pieces to the small pile and soniced it, making the metal pieces turn into new dollars. "I usually do," she said, handing the coins over to the shop attendant.

"This is all we have, I'm afraid", River said. "Can we please now know where your raw products come from?"

The woman didn't reply, but started to shove up something that smelled like, well, undefined sea food into two bowls.

"I have to book the information as food," she said when they were looking questioning at her. "The authorities are very hard nowadays, they can trace every new dollar in your system. If the amount of portions left doesn't match the cash, I'll go to jail."

"Here you go," she finished and dashed the bowls down on the counter with a spoon each. "Eat it all, it's shrimp, the best taste around here. And now I'll give you what you came for."

She turned around in the small booth and with difficulty opened a large cupboard behind her. "This is where my raw products are. I make it all from what's in here," she said, pulling the door ajar.

River and the Doctor gaped. River held her hand in mid-air, the undefined goo with shrimp taste slowly dripping from the spoon. The cupboard was stuffed with large plastic jars that contained pink powder. The labels said "Fish, shrimp and cray fish ester".

"Esters? That's it? But you can't make a whole dish out of just esters!" the Doctor protested.

"No, that's true. But the rest is just barque, actually," the woman said . "Scraped from the Christmas three. What did you expect?"

"Well, fish, maybe?" River suggested.

At that, the attendant burst out in great laughter. "Fish?" she bellowed, while wiping away tears of joy from her face. "Like, real fish that once swam in the ocean? Where are you from? A mental institution? There hasn't been fish around here for centuries, maybe not even at all since the Old Earth was destroyed. Hahaha! Nut cases. Fish! Well, enjoy your 'fish' then! Good bye!" She finished her little speech with closing the booth with a bam. They could still hear her laughter from inside the closed cover.

"Well, now what? Maybe someone from the future has another good idea?" the Doctor said, galcing over at River. She glared at him, but didn't have a proper come back. "Did you actually like this?" she said instead, nodding at the bowl. "It smells totally disguising."

"I'll have it," the Doctor said happily, reaching out for her bowl since he had already finished his own. "Haven't been this hungry since-"

"Excuse me," a very tired voice said behind their backs. They turned around, only to see a thin, dingy old man clad in nothing but rags. His hair hung in dirty stripes down his neck, and he didn't seem to have shaved for weeks. He smelled pretty bad, too, if you were to think about it.

The old man looked the Doctor in the eye and swallowed. "Normally, I don't..." he started, but stopped mid-sentence, cleared his throat and looked down on his feet.

"Normally I don't do this," he said again, trying to start over. "I've had too much pride earlier on, but since my son got fired the unemployed family members became too many, and now not even the bins will feed us anymore. I saw that you had that bowl of that soup, or whatever it is, and I was thinking... Um, I was wondering..." He trailed off again.

"Go on," the Doctor urged him on, "you were wondering what?"

"I was wondering if, if I... If I might have that bowl of soup of yours," the man finally finished. A slight blush crept up his cheeks, and he was trying to hide his face underneath his collar. "You see, we're so hungry, so very hungry, the family and me. We haven't eaten in, I don't know, a week, and I saw that you've already had one, so I thought..."

"Of course," the Doctor said, without hesitation. "Of course." He handed the bowl over to the old man, who smiled at him. "Thank you, sir," he said. "I will never forget this. Thank you." He bowed at the Doctor.

"Oh, I'm no sir," the Doctor said, "please don't call me that. And, please, please do not, under any circumstances, bow at me. I am the Doctor, very nice to meet you, Mr...?"

"Folo." The old man shook the hand that the Doctor had reached out.

"And your family, Mr. Folo, how many are they?"

"We're eight with the small ones," the old man said. "It's going to be hard to split this bowl, but we'll have to try..."

"No, you won't have to try doing that," the Doctor said. "Never while I'm still alive." In a wink, he turned on the heel and walked back to the food stand.

"Open up!" he shouted. "I have another customer here!"

The woman who owned the stand pushed the doors open. "A customer?" she said, all ears. "How many bowls are we talking about?"

"I had sixteen in mind," the Doctor said, "since Mr. Folo's family consists of eight people."

"Okay, that will be one hundred and sixty five knuspers, then," the shopkeeper said, rubbing her hands together. "Sixteen? Really? People around here never by that much anymore. Must be my lucky day!" she said to herself, and turned her back to the the Doctor, River and Mr. Folo. She started to shove up the goo in different jars and bowls.

"Well, yes, that's the little problem," the Doctor said. "You see, we don't really have any money left. But since Mr. Folo here is starving, and since no individual should never starve, you'll give it to him anyways, right?"

The woman just stared at the Doctor. "I wouldn't even give you a piece of information for free, and now you're expecting me to give away food?" she said, laughing. "Of course I won't give away food. In times like these? Give away food? If I started to do that, I would soon have half of New Central Park hanging about here, begging for mercy. No, one is strongest when one cares for herself." The shop keeper tried to close the door, but the Doctor put his hand in between the door frame and the leaf.

"I tell you this once: people should never starve. Have you ever starved? Do you know what it feels like to be so very hungry your very stomach has shrunken?"

"I don't, and I don't care, either," the woman said. "I have driven up this business with my own hands, I did it by myself when the times were good, I didn't lay on the sofa doing nothing. I worked, and I worked hard and now in a crisis, I alone will reap the harvest. I refuse to share that work with some lazy old man that didn't." She shoved the door closed in the Doctor's face.

The Doctor stood in silence for a moment. Then, in a loud and clear voice, thoroughly articulating each and every word, he said:

"Open that door."

Nothing happened.

The Doctor cleared his throat and spoke up a bit.

"I strongly recommend that you open that door."

"I second that," River said loudly, taking out her gun and slowly pulling the trigger back. The Doctor glanced at her, but didn't object.

There was still no life sign from inside the stand.

The Doctor went straight up to the door and pressed his face very close to the key hole. "You will open this door, you will open it _now_ or something bad will happen, I assure you," he snarled between gritted teeth. "There is a very hungry man out here accompanied by me and Professor Song who are totally mad in different ways and very hungry people and general lunatics tend to do very, very bad things to those who have food but won't give it to those who starve," he continued.

Still, nothing happened. The Doctor exhaled and backed up a little.

"I'm counting to three, then I'm going in!" he said, very calm now. "One... Two... Three!" He pulled out his screwdriver and violently whirred it at the lock, but the door wouldn't open. He tried a different angle, but still couldn't manage to get in.

As this frustration grew stronger, something seemed to snap a little inside him and he violently threw himself at the door, kicking at it, thumping at it, whirring at the lock, roaring "I DEMAND YOU TO OPEN, OTHERWISE I CAN'T BE RESPONSIBLE FOR WHAT'S GOING TO HAPPEN-"

"Sweetie," River said quiet. She put a hand on his shoulder.

The Doctor turned over to look at her and then, he fell silent.

Slowly, he let go on the door handle. "Get it open," he hissed at her.

River didn't say anything, just gently moved him away from the door and took a couple of steps backwards. With a single hand movement, she aimed her gun and with one perfectly placed bullet, she blew the lock open. Inside the stand sat the terrified attendant curled up in a corner. "You better think it over before you do not obey his wishes again," River said, while entering the stand and getting the all of the remaining goo out.

When she handed it over to the old man, he almost cried. "Thank you," he said, his voice a little shaky. "Thank you. I will never forget this. And, also, there was something else I was going to tell you, as a thank you for the food... I overheard you talking to her about fish before. I don't know what you're looking for, but before I got fired, I used to work at the blind alley of New Guernsey Street. Very often, people passed with something that looked suspiciously like fish, real fish, over there. I think you might have to go have a look, you might find at least a clue to what you're looking for." The man prepared to leave, carrying the large pot with goo under his arm. "And, once again: thank you. Now my family and I will have a slight possibility to not starve at Christmas, at least."

He gave them a slight nod, and in a blink, he was gone.

The Doctor and River just stood there, River was watching the Doctor intensely. She waited for him to speak. The Doctor, though, was all of a sudden very interested in a stain on his trainers. He swallowed.

"River, I..." he finally said.

"I know," she replied. "You can't help it. It's just the way you are, these days." She smiled a little, sadly, he thought, and then she reached out for his hand.

"Come on, you old fool. Let's go to New Guernsey Street."


End file.
